Blessing

I sure hope those chicks hatched and the hen went nuts and knocked the steel trash bin over. Other option is a possum or raccoon coming for dinner. I’m not sure if the big raccoon or any of his fig-tree-climbing kin actually eat meat. They seem too cute and peaceful to knock over an Oscar the Grouch trash can and attack the hen and her eggs.

Evidence seems to suggest that some hatched, for if an animal were to have been the cause of this calamity all of the eggs would be broken. Of the dozen, three remained intact.

If I were braver…or crazy, I would take those solid eggs and eat them. But I learned my lesson with a duck egg from the Chinese grocery, and though a man who likes to explore, I know balut is not my thing. 

I spent an hour at the school garden this morning, clearing grass from a box where some kind of squash came up, and if I go back to the day that I dropped all the seeds I could find out the exact kind of squash. I could find out what is coming up in the other boxes.

Much the same as realizations came. Take care first of what you already have. Take care of what grows in the ground. So I mulch around dianthus and think of my grandma. I mulch around Thai red roselle and remember when Parkway Partners still existed. I cut grass from box number three and use the lower branches of moringa and pigeon pea as a layer of nitrogen under the heavy carbon mulch.

I respect life, breathing or otherwise. It pains me to see a dead bird, a hunter judging from her claws. I never hesitate to offer a body back to the earth even if this means planting a kumquat tree atop bird in the middle of summer 

Worry is a beast that competes with others. I want to keep with what I have started. I want to see the school garden become a place where children continue to taste the berries. I want bees and butterflies to be a source for wonder. I want there to be spots where kids might sit and for moments pretend they are somewhere else. For moments, pretend they are something else. For moments, be present with a being a part of all of this.

I must remember I work for somebody else. They pay me to keep the garden a certain way, and if I can come, early in the morning, take down the grass in the boxes, I can use these boxes as giant pots that I build up and interplant annuals with perennials. 

How to create a system that serves nature while respecting the wishes of the humans who trust me with their land? And why am I doing this? Other than the pay. It is the way for me to see how I am a part of life, and I believe that by paying attention to what is beyond manmade, that man will realize that she is a part of all of this, that there is no separation, that hurting the earth hurts me.

And I'm on one side of the school, thinking about connection, thinking about interaction, working to support a system, feeling good about the progress made thus far, blessing the bird beneath the kumquat tree, satisfied that every act is an act of beginning.

I leave, turn left and left again, to the space where Ruby Bridges got hit with tomatoes. I pass an Orkin Pest Control truck. Four men spray poison onto the building and beside the steps where armed guards led a five-year-old girl into school while white parents screamed and spit and demanded the races stay separate